Harvard Art Museums

"I have drunk deeply of late from the foundation Of my black culture, sat at the knee and learned From Mother Africa, discovered the truth of my heritage, The truth, so often obscured and omitted. And I find I have much to say to my black children." Margaret T.G. Burroughs In 1963, Margaret Taylor Goss Burroughs (1915-2010) wrote “What Shall I Tell My Children Who Are Black (Reflections of an African-American Mother).” The poem’s speaker wishes to share with Black children the confidence and self-knowledge to withstand racism. “I will lift their heads in proud blackness,” she writes, through the history of ancient African culture. Burroughs’s numerous achievements as an educator, artist, and co-founder of the DuSable Museum of African American History and Culture were in service of preserving and presenting Mother Africa’s truths. Two years after she wrote the poem, Burroughs carved a linocut titled “Mother Africa.” This print is recreated in “Carving Out Time’s” second scene, hanging on the playroom wall. Against a lush setting populated with ferns, palm trees, and thatched-roof dwellings, a woman in three-quarter profile fills the sheet. Her hair is parted and tied back behind her ears, and she wears a white garment across one shoulder. Both Burroughs and LaToya Hobbs’s prodigious technical skills are showcased by the variety of textures they achieve, including skin, hair, and fabric. Hobbs locates “Mother Africa” beside her own body in the composition; as Hobbs teaches her son, the print communicates Mother Africa’s wisdom through the lens of Burroughs, a fellow Black woman, educator, artist, and printmaker. Follow this series to learn about the eight artists whose works Hobbs incorporated into her monumental series of prints, “Carving Out Time,” on view at the Harvard Art Museums through July 21. ✍️ by Nora Rosengarten, Ph.D. Candidate, History of Art and Architecture